


Mint green

by edvic



Series: glitter [1]
Category: Harry Potter - J. K. Rowling
Genre: Age Difference, Alternate Universe - Modern Setting, Established Relationship, Frottage, Gender Issues, Genderqueer Character, Lawyers, Light-Hearted, M/M, Mild Sexual Content, Trans Character
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2019-09-29
Updated: 2019-09-29
Packaged: 2020-11-07 16:09:22
Rating: Mature
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 3,066
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/20820107
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/edvic/pseuds/edvic
Summary: “You’re so dumb,” Harry murmurs under his breath, not bothering to look up from his sudoku. “Sometimes,” he adds after a moment of thought....Tom is trying to be a supportive partner. Harry doesn't make it easy.





	Mint green

**Author's Note:**

> Hi! Just to make things clear - fic is tagged M/M for search purposes mostly. Harry's gender is not specified, but as the story is written from Tom's POV, he/him pronouns are used, because that's how he's been addressing Harry since they've met.

“You’re so dumb,” Harry murmurs under his breath, not bothering to look up from his sudoku. “Sometimes,” he adds after a moment of thought.

Sitting with legs crossed - Star Wars T-shirt, no pants, wild hair slowly drying around his face - Harry looks like a beast temporarily too busy with its favourite pastime to bother looking at the easy prey within its reach.

From across the kitchen table, Tom tries once more.

“Do you want to talk about it? You know I’m here for you.”

For the next three minutes - Tom's watching the clock closely, waiting for their pasta to boil at last - Harry ignores him as if the question never happened. 

It's annoying. Like some of his clients, Harry decides to use his right to remain silent. 

Works fine enough in court. Not so spectacularly in relationships.

"I can hear you thinking," his boyfriend is still busy with the top left square, biting his nails. Tom wants to take his pencil away and write down the missing _ seven _. "Did I really make such an impression on you?"

He hums indistinctly. It's hard to tell how he feels about it.

Last week, during the housewarming party at Augusta's place, where they were celebrating_ the end of hammering and drilling _as well as Minerva's birthday, Harry entered the loft late, wearing a mint green skirt, and Tom blinked and wiped his eyes in surprise. He had seen Harry’s questionable fashion choices before, ugly Christmas sweaters and jumpsuits and way too many bracelets to fit his wrists, but this… It wasn’t entirely unexpected or shocking, just… different.

"I didn't dislike it," he says in the end, realizing that their pasta is ready and soon will be overcooked.

They are both so hopeless at cooking it's a miracle they survived almost three years together without dying of hunger. 

Perhaps come is substantial enough. Like protein shakes.

It's Harry's turn to hum. Tom sees him cross the _ seven _ and write a _ nine _instead. It's sharp and lacks the curve at the bottom. 

"I didn't dislike it either."

He barely stops himself from sighing. Even his patience has its limit, but now isn't the best time to test it, he thinks. In the end, it's not about him. 

His tastes are simple, much simpler than Harry's. He likes waking up and seeing his boyfriend's messy hair on the pillow next to his, he likes messing that hair even more and listening to Harry's annoyed _ some people are trying to sleep_. He likes drinking his coffee white and with lots of sugar. He likes finishing work early on Fridays and pretending he knows how to cook, following recipes as closely as he can, more often than not forgetting to add salt and pepper to his gazpacho. 

Harry is different. 

It was obvious from the day they had met, Tom following Regulus, Harry brought home by Sirius, their fates entwined once more as they played charades in teams. They won, easily, and jerked each other off in the guest bedroom when everyone else was trying to decide if they should go clubbing or stay home for another round of shots. Harry wanted to go to the cinema; some indie movie was playing that night.

To his surprise they ended in Harry's apartment, not his, and for the first time in years he had to wonder what to do with himself in the morning, picking his shirt up from the floor. When he reached for Harry’s head, giving into the urge to kiss him one more time and smelling the cucumber shampoo on his hair, Harry blinked and yawned and smiled and told him to stay for breakfast.

And so he did.

Some days Harry is still a mystery to him, unfolding slowly through memories on quiet evenings or rapidly like a summer storm when they are both drunk, one hungry for the other. 

There is a black dress in their closet - _ for Halloween _ \- and the glittery costume Harry got after a photo shoot last year. There's even more glitter in the cabinet in their bathroom.

After the Mint Green Skirt Incident, Tom feels confused.

"I'm trying to be a supportive partner," he says, pasta landing on their table, still steaming hot.

"If you were a supportive partner, you would have told me that I didn't shave the back of my legs."

Harry ignores his plate in favour of sudoku.

"I thought you did it on purpose," nudging the pasta a little bit closer to his boyfriend's nose, Tom sits down. The green olives he forgot to add to the sauce are now idly lying in a bowl right between them. "As a political statement."

"My whole _ existence _ is a political statement, give me a break sometimes.” Fingers drum on the wooden table, impatient or nervous, Tom's not sure, and Harry finally decides to look at him. “You really are dumb. Sometimes," he adds when Tom tries to move the plate away, tired of their banter. 

They eat in silence. 

It’s odd, to sit there without Harry’s usual Friday evening chatter, so full of emotions some days Tom has no chance to share a single thought. 

Not that he minds - he never expected to form something lasting again, let alone with someone so obviously out of his league - and after spending whole days arguing in court, he prefers listening. Harry is bright and thoughtful and sensible and his opinions on are wonderfully strong, so very unlike Tom's, sometimes bordering on the edge of inappropriate when they are visiting Tom's business partners. At first, he apologized, later, he learned to watch Harry’s passion for politics from the sideline. 

It’s like living on the edge of a volcano sometimes, being with Harry. 

Tonight, the contrast only makes his uneasiness stronger. 

He’s right. Something’s wrong.

Not as wrong as the pasta hopefully. The lack of olives is striking and Tom is almost sure it’s not the only ingredient he forgot about.

“Blue cheese,” he says, spotting the open box by the fridge. 

“Blue cheese?” Harry blinks, following his gaze.

"I wanted all of my favourite things in one place - blue cheese, your awful face,” he says, getting up only to set the cheese right next to the equally forgotten olives a moment later, “the overcooked pasta, my miserable attempts at being a cook… Did I mention your awful face?”

Metal shrieks against tiles, the chair moving with Tom as he takes a place by Harry's side, stealing his fork and watching the small smirk curving the left corner of his lips up. Harry’s so stubborn about smiling sometimes. 

Their knees touch under the table. 

Harry leans down to take his bite, smile still lingering on his face. His long fingers travel up Tom's leg, settling high on his thigh. 

“We could've ordered something, you know?” 

“In this economy?”

The sound of Harry’s laughter is throaty and wild. At first, it pearls off his tongue and into the brightly lit room, loud until his hands rise up to cover his mouth. With his head thrown back and the long column of his neck bare - a paling hickey peeking right under the hem of his shirt - Harry doesn’t look like his usual self, frowning upon the news in the morning. Laughing, he looks his age. 

When their lips meet, Tom tastes the unfortunate pasta on Harry’s tongue and Harry dives into his embrace eagerly as they shift, up and down again, his arms lifting Harry with a crack in his joints. 

The table shakes when they crash into it, a high awful screech reaching their ears through the sweetly growing mist of _ want _ and _ yes _until something shatters and Harry hisses. 

“Plate or glass?”

Tom looks over the edge, hands never leaving Harry’s skin under his _Trust me I’m a Jedi _shirt; Harry’s ankles are digging into back.

“Glass,” he says, spotting the shreds. 

Orange juice looks much less macabre than the red wine they spilled a month ago, creating a crime scene, fresh and not very clean, two amateurs’ job. Only the bittersweet scent of fermented grapes and come lingering in the air made it clear what exactly happened.

“We’ll have to buy a new set,” Harry murmurs between breaths as their heartbeats merge in another kiss, soft press of lips against each other. “There’s only three…”

… _ left_, he feels the word on his teeth; Harry’s tongue is still talking.

They melt into each other, like evening waves melt into the sleeping shore, familiar and exciting all the same, knowing each passage and looking for new ways to be, as if every evening is both a beginning and an end, a continuation and a fresh start.

Harry is easily the most wonderful person Tom had ever met. 

His thumbs press into the warm skin covering Harry's stomach and he feels his muscles flex with each ragged breath. Soft on the surface and hard underneath - just like his character, Harry's body is deceiving, making him look awkward and out of place at times, when he’s not.

When he saw him that morning three years ago, Tom felt undeserving.

_ You’re so dumb _ echoes in his head; as a rule, Harry offers little reassurance to his concerns.

So he takes what is offered to him and enjoys it while it lasts, trying not to dwell on the countless possibilities. It’s not easier than worrying - _ that’s _in his nature - but it’s healthier. Living the moment.

His elbows hit the table, smashing Harry down, and his hands trace Harry's ribs, wandering up the ladder covered with warm skin and hair, higher and higher, until his fingers hook under the elastic band around Harry's heart.

So it’s one of these days.

With a slow roll of hips, lips find lips and nails graze over nipples and fabric; he catches the breathy moan off Harry's mouth before it breaches the border of air. He circles, slowly, and under his touch, he feels a speeding heartbeat. It pulses through his thumb, lazily seeping into his bloodstream, and soon he’s no longer sure where is his body starting and Harry's ending, as if they were one a long time ago, before the dawn of days. His pulse echoes in Harry's veins, his breathing is a reflection of Harry's lashes fluttering upon his cheeks.

The thought vanishes when they part, Harry's arms raising to get rid of his shirt and when they come back to each other, lace scratching Tom’s skin, he smiles.

"Beautiful," his voice ghosts above Harry's neck, following the pulsing artery, down, down, to the tattoo on his collarbone, and he feels the shiver shaking them both.

Ankles to the back of his thighs, hands tilting up his chin, Harry makes him stop the feverish, sloppy kiss with a firm_, _

“I know.”

Eyes, dark and endless and smiling, the same eyes that took his _ I thought you'd never ask _with calm ease, blink at him, heat merging with exhaustion after a hectic week. Mint green, he thinks, tracing the odd lock Harry dyed a few weeks ago.

If only he could know what was the meaning of it all.

Now is not the time to ask, not when Harry is hunger draped in flesh and his own thoughts are scattered and chaotic, hands undressing Harry further, until he touches him really, and his lips open, thirsty. The lights falling off the lamp above their heads are dancing on Harry’s stomach in yellow flickers.

Roaming down, following the dusky shadow of hair, he lets his hand rest between Harry's legs and feels his inhale against his arm, fingers digging into his back.

A lazy smile grows on his lips. His hand reaches for the shelf.

Harry closes his eyes, but his mouth part in a gasp.

“Fuck," he says. “Did you buy…”

“Fuck,” Harry’s curse is much more vicious in tone. “I forgot.”

They look at each other with unfocused eyes. The odd angle almost gives Harry a double chin.

Tom taps the line of his jaw.

“Did we open the one from Sirius?”

“You ate it all straight out of my ass.”

Out of the two of them, Harry is definitely more skilled in wording his thoughts so straightforwardly; it used to take Tom aback.

“I have a vague memory of it,” he follows Harry's fingers, leading him lower. “You didn’t seem to mind.”

“You know how to use your stupid lawyer mouth.”

“Should I...?"

He heards another throaty laugh and a whispered _ dumb _somewhere in it, but before he can answer somehow, protest, Harry brings them together, closing his legs tighter around Tom's waist, Tom’s underwear’s still perfectly in place, the inseam of his briefs grazing against his heated skin with every abortive thrust into Harry’s thigh.

Once more, their lips meet, briefly, and soon Harry lays on the table like the main course Tom didn’t manage to prepare. 

Once more, he is in awe.

There are fingers in his hair, curling around his skull like spider’s legs, and his hands trace the uneven line connecting the seven moles between Harry’s heart and hip bone. It always reminds him of Scorpius, with the bright Antares next to Harry’s navel, and his teeth graze the surface of Harry's skin, leaving a mark where he is missing the eight star.

He drinks each ragged breath, and he marvels at the way Harry's body is following his own, back arching off the table, nipples peaking, legs parting to let him move. He loved before and he wanted too, but somehow, Harry feels like so much more.

In a dream, they'd never run out of lube, he thinks, pressing a kiss to Harry's thigh.

Tom smiles, grasping Harry’s waist right above the pointed ends of his hip bones, dragging him closer to the edge. His legs are hanging off the table aimless but tense, waiting.

A broken whimper reaches his ears. The table moves again.

“... princess,” his whisper ghosts over heated skin; his nose is buried in the curly hair hovering under Harry’s navel.

Under his hands, steadying the urging thrusts, Harry freezes.

“What did you say?”

There is a puzzling tone in Harry's voice as he sits up, looking at Tom in the odd, haunting way he knows well. When they first met, Harry reminded him of a doe caught by hounds. Some days - rarely, far less often than before - it seems like the hounds are after him again.

“... princess."

For a brief moment Harry's eyes are dark and searching, uncertain, looking for something in Tom it seems. It makes him uneasy, the weight of it, but then-

“What the fuck, Tom?”

The laughter that escapes Harry's parted lips is even louder than earlier; it crushes into Tom, taking him by surprise. He doesn’t understand. There is a nervous edge to it, something secret, like a private joke only Harry can understand, and just like he did for the past week, Tom feels lost again. 

“Where did you- You weren’t watching some stupid Youtube videos again, were you?”

He makes a face, he knows he were.

Harry’s looking at him with fondness, as if he’s trying to talk with a preschooler. The unsaid _ you wouldn’t understand _ echoes in his head. It sounds familiar, oddly close to _ you’re so dumb, sometimes. _

“It’s confusing to me, Harry,” he tries to defend himself. “_You’re _ confusing.”

Long fingers are tracing the lines on his face, smoothing them out, from his chin to his cheek to his ear, and a soft breath tickles his scalp.

“And you’ve only realized now?”

It’s not the right moment to talk, not with Harry’s hands trying to distract him - on purpose, perhaps - and his words feel out of place.

“I know it’s not easy for you,” he says, feeling Harry lean closer, nosing down his neck, curling into himself like a cat, trying to reach his heart. “I can’t help you if you never tell me anything.”

“Shhh,” a kiss falls on his arm, heat seeping into his bones once more; Harry's wandering hand finally rests at the bottom of his stomach. “This is easy.”

And so they start again, differently this time, with Harry's body flush to his own, Harry's fingers lacing with his.

His pants land on the floor, his shirt hooked on the edge of his chair. 

Harry is panting into his hair, holding him close, rutting into their linked hands. He’s selfish, he’s gone; and yet his chest is heaving in unison with Tom’s breaths and Tom’s pulse is mirroring the one running under his fingertips, slicked and moving easier and their moves become more erratic.

Harry bites the lobe of his ear and he hisses, breaking the moan forming deep in his throat. He loves it, the unexpected, the rough. He loves everything Harry is willing to give him - his teeth, his hands, his grins and his laughs - he loves the sweetness of it, the bitterness. 

His fingers curl, his lips found Harry’s jaw, Harry’s lips parted in a gasp. Sweaty and panting, but so rarely pliant, Harry tries to laugh.

They need it both equally now, the tight embrace and the final stroke, and Harry grounds against him once more, trying to take the lead.

He doesn’t hear his name when they fall, but he feels it in Harry’s throat, building at the base of it, rattling. One syllable, a sharp breath. He recognizes it easily and grazes off Harry’s neck with his teeth, letting it stay inside. It’s safe there.

He takes half a step back. There is a stain on Harry’s thigh. 

With hair plastered to his forehead, Harry looks exhausted. His legs, swinging unconsciously, tremble in small shivers. Tom can feel them under his palm as he smears come into Harry’s skin.

“I hate it,” Harry says. “The mess.”

“We should stick to the bedroom.”

“You say it every time.”

He smiles, barely. He needs to sit down.

The chair is close, and before Harry can sway and fall, Tom is next to him again, head resting on his thigh.

He feels something cold at the seam of his lips. Cold and round.

“Enjoy your meal, Tom.”

He hums against Harry’s fingers. The first olive tastes sour. The second one is bitter. His eyes are fluttering shut.

“Promise me we’ll talk about it,” he says, trying to chew. The olives are replaced with blue cheese. 

A gentle hand pats his head. Somewhere above him, he hears a yawn.

**Author's Note:**

> Thanks for reading!


End file.
